Locking Down Facebook*

*As much as possible

Always assume that anything in your Facebook profile will be seen publicly. Keep this in mind when you upload photos, update your status, and post comments on other timelines. The developers at Facebook give us some ways to limit who can see some of our activities, though.

Step-by-step method to make Facebook as private as possible: (using a browser, not the app)

Sign in and open the drop down menu at the far right arrow. Choose Settings and then look at General Account Settings. I recommend that you not use your true full name as your profile name or add other names. You can edit this setting here. Below, you can set up a legacy contact if you haven’t already.
In the Contact section, make sure your email us up-to-date, remove other emails or phone numbers, and uncheck the option for friends to download your email address.
Set up a Legacy contact if you want.
In the Security and Login settings, you can see where you are logged in. At the bottom of the list, you can log out of every device and start again.
Update your password to something more secure. If you’re not using a password manager (KeePassXC), then pick 5 random words from a dictionary. Never choose the login with your profile picture!
The most secure option for signing in is the two-factor authentication (2FA). I don’t use it for Facebook because I don’t care enough about being locked out to give them my phone number.
Under Authorized Logins, check and remove all but your current devices. For App Passwords, I don’t use any other apps, so I didn’t need to remove this option.
Set up extra security next by choosing alerts and notifications for logins from new devices. Choose a friend or two to help you log in if you’re locked out of your account.
I didn’t set up encrypted emails for account recovery. Please don’t set up other accounts through Facebook or log in to other accounts using your Facebook login. That’s just asking for problems when Facebook has access to other account information.
In Your Facebook Information, you can download everything Facebook knows about you and your profile. You can also see all of your past Activity.
Open the Privacy Settings option, change the future posts to Friends or Only me. This will be the new default setting for your posts, but always check this before clicking Post on any status updates.
Review everything you’re tagged in. If you’re tagged in any public posts or you checked in to a public location, these are visible to the public regardless of your privacy settings.
Click on Limit Past Posts to change the audience of all your previous public posts to Friends only.
Under How People Find and Contact You, limit all these options to as few people as possible. Who can send friend requests? Friends of Friends; Who can see friend list? Only me; Who can look you up? Friends; Do you want search engines to link to your account? No. Make sure you don’t allow Followers.
Go get a glass of wine or take a break. This has been painful.
Under Timeline and Tagging, Who can post to your timeline? Either Friends or Only Me are fine as long as you have your account set to review before adding any posts to your Timeline; Who can see what others post to your timeline? Limit this to Only Me or Friends; Turn OFF post sharing to Stories; Hide comments containing words, I haven’t added any words since I review everything before it’s visible.
Next set, Who can see posts you’re tagged in? Limit to Friends or Only Me. Set the next choice to Only Me; you don’t want someone adding to the audience after you’ve set it.
The next two options are where you can control everything by Reviewing it before it posts. Turn both these options ON.
Location settings, TURN them OFF. If there is location history stored in your account, delete it.
For the Restricted list, add anyone who is shady, but you don’t feel like you can Unfriend or Block them without causing more drama. They won’t be able to see posts shared with Friends.
Blocking is wonderful. If you know someone who has been stalking or who might use your publicly visible information, add them to your blocked list. Just remember how easy it is to create another profile. If they really want to see your public information, they will. You can also block messages from users in Messenger and Game apps, Events, Apps, and Pages.
Face Recognition: set that option to NO.
Notifications: for peace of mind, keep these limited. You do want to know all activity that involves you, though. Where you’re tagged, mentioned, etc… Turn that notification ON. You should not give Facebook your cell phone number, so your notifications will be via email.
Mobile phone- remove it.
Public Posts Filters and Tools- Who can Follow me? Friends only; Public Post Comments? Friends; Public posts notifications? set to Public; Who can comment on your Public Profile? Friends only.
Apps and Website settings: If you have anything showing in Active, delete it all. Remove everything possible. Under the Preferences section, turn OFF the Apps, Websites and Games section and limit old versions to Only Me.
Instant Games- remove everything
Business integrations- no idea what this is, but remove everything
Ad Preferences- This can take some time so don’t try to do it all at once. Notice that for each section you open, there are multiple TABS across from left to right that contain information about you, also. Your Interests show what Facebook tracks about you and your demographics. Go through and remove as much as possible. They will continue to add items as you interact with pages and Facebook accounts. In the Advertisers section, they track all businesses you interact with and add some based on your interests. These can all be deleted by clicking the X. In the Your Information, you can TURN OFF what they share. Click on everything that is in color to turn off the option. In the Ad Settings section, change everything to Not Allowed or No One. Under Hide Ad Topics, I chose them all, just for fun.
Payments settings- I’ve never entered anything here, so I have no information. If you have added information, credit cards, or anything, remove it.
Support Inbox shows any messages from Facebook Support for any reports you made or reports made about your profile.
Videos- contains the settings for playing videos in your Timeline. I turned off the auto-play video choice because it’s annoying when they start to play when I don’t want to see them.

The length of this list illustrates the privacy intrusion Facebook can be in our lives. Please limit your settings as much as possible. This will mitigate your exposure to harmful third-party apps Facebook allows to see data about you, not to mention people who just want to stalk your profile.

Take a look at your Friends list. You can categorize your friends as Close Friends, who see everything in your profile and all posts, or Acquaintances who can see limited parts of your profile and posts. If you need to limit people, do! UNFriend everyone you don’t know personally.

Go to your profile by clicking on your name and profile picture at the top. Open your About tab. You’ll see all the categories on the left side starting with Overview. Choose each option and review what you have entered here. Mouse over every option and look at the right side. As you mouse over each entry, the right side will show an edit option and the audience for that entry. Change everything to either Only Me or Friends. If you have any items set to Public, you will be searchable based on that category and visible to the public.

In your Photos section, check the audience for your photo albums and limit them to Friends or Only Me. Check the Photos of Me section and make sure none of them are public. You may need to Remove the Tag by mousing over your name in the post and selecting that option.

For your Likes sections and Music, Books, Movies, etc… you can Manage these by editing the audience. Click Manage or the pencil icon on the right side of the window and Remove the section or Edit Privacy.

When you comment on a pubic page or profile, your post is visible publicly. If you belong to any Public groups, you are visible to everyone on and off Facebook. If you’re an administrator or moderator in Closed groups, your profile is visible to everyone on Facebook.

Remember that these things are always publicly visible:

Profile photo, its description, location, Likes, and comments
Cover photo, its description, location, Likes, and comments
Featured photos, their descriptions, locations, Likes, and comments
Photo albums for featured, profile, and cover photos

Find the Privacy Checkup option under the Question Mark icon next to your Notifications (bell) icon. Here, you can limit the audience for everything you entered about yourself in the About section (birthday, marital status, location, education, etc…) We used to be able to View Profile as Public, but I can’t find that option today. If you know how to find it now, let me know.

Honestly, if anyone comes up with another medium to keep up with my family and friends as we move wherever the military moves us, I’m jumping ship from Facebook. Their lack of security and invasive nature are just too much to deal with anymore.

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